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The Islamic State posted a video today that it said showed the beheading of James Foley, an
American journalist who was kidnapped in Syria nearly two years ago, according to a transcript
released by the SITE Intelligence Group.

The authenticity of the video, which was posted on YouTube, could not be immediately
verified, and a telephone call placed to Foley’s family was not immediately returned. YouTube later
took down the 4-minute, 40-second video.

Titled “A Message to America,” the video shows the journalist kneeling in a deserted
landscaped, clad in an orange jumpsuit — an apparent reference to the uniforms worn by prisoners at
the U.S. military detention camp in Guantánamo, Cuba. Standing to his left is a masked Islamic
State fighter, who says that Foley’s execution is in retaliation for the U.S. airstrikes ordered by
President Barack Obama against the extremist group in Iraq.

Former hostages held alongside Foley in Syria — who were released earlier this year in
exchange for multimillion-dollar ransoms — have said that before the airstrikes began, the Islamic
State had been asking for money in exchange for Foley’s release.

“I call on my friends, family and loved ones to rise up against my real killers — the U.S.
government — for what will happen to me is only a result of their complacent criminality,” Foley
says in the video, which was uploaded to the online account of the al-Furqan Media Foundation,
according to SITE, which follows jihadist groups.

Foley, 40, a freelance journalist who was working for GlobalPost, an online publication based
in Boston, as well as Agence France-Presse, went missing on Nov. 22, 2012 in Syria. He was held
alongside several other U.S. prisoners, whose families have insisted on a news blackout.

The video concludes with the fighter threatening to kill Steven Sotloff, another U.S.
national who was being held alongside Foley. The young man is seen kneeling in the same position,
in the same landscape and wearing the same, orange-colored jumpsuit. “The life of this American
citizen, Obama, depends on your next decision,” says the fighter.